CHAPTER XXXIV
AN ACCIDENT
It was early morning, and the mist lay heavy upon the forest and on thebosom of the James. Landless and Patricia raked together the dyingembers of their fire and heaped fresh wood upon them. The flames leapedup, warming their chilled bodies and filling the hollow that had beentheir camping place with a cheerful light, in which the moisture thatclothed tree bole and fallen log and withered fern glistened likediamonds. Their breakfast of deer meat and broiled fish, nuts and a fewlate clusters of grape, with coldest water from a spring hard by, waseaten amidst laughter and pleasant talk. When they had lingered throughit and when Landless had carefully extinguished their fire and had seento the priming of his gun, they addressed themselves to their journey.
A bowshot away was the river, and Patricia willed that they walk alongits banks that they might see the white mist lift, and the silver flashof fish rising from the water, and the swoop of the kingfisher. Landlessagreeing, they went down to the river, and standing upon a rocky spit ofground which ran far out into the stream, they looked down the mistyexpanse, then turned involuntarily and looked up. At that moment the foglifted.
"Ah!" cried Patricia, and shrunk back, cowering almost to the ground.
Landless seized her in his arms and ran with her across the shingle andup the bank. Plunging into the woods he made for the little stream whichflowed past their camping place, and entering the water, walked rapidlyup it.
"Did they see us?" Patricia asked in a low, strained voice.
"I am afraid so."
"They turned their boats towards the land. They are in the forest bynow."
"Yes."
"And there is no doubt that they are the same. I saw the scarlethandkerchief upon the head of the mulatto."
"Yes, they are the same."
"They were such a little way from us. Oh, they may be upon us at anymoment!"
"We are in great danger," he answered gravely, "but it is not soimminent as that. They were nearly a mile above us, and they have toland, to hide their boats and to find our trail, all of which will taketime. We may count on having an hour's start of them, and we will do allin our power to increase it by breaking our trail as we are doing now.Then we cannot be many leagues from the falls, and the post below them,or we may stumble at any moment upon some Monacan village which will notneed our urging to fly out against the Ricahecrians. Please God, we willwin through them yet."
Somewhat comforted, she lay within his arms without speaking until theyleft the stream, when he set her down, and giving her his hand, ran withher over the fallen leaves down the long aisles of the forest.
Red gold showers fell upon them; fiery vines clutched at their feet, or,swinging from the trees, struck at their faces with vicious tendrils;the pines made the ground beneath like ice; rotting logs covered withgorgeous fungi barred their way; dark and poisonous swamps appearedbefore them, and had to be skirted--the forest leagued itself with itschildren and did them yeoman service.
The two aliens hastened breathlessly on. The sun climbed above the treetops and looked down upon them through the half denuded branches. Middaycame, and the short bright afternoon, and still they went fast throughthe woods, and still they heard no other sound than the rustle and soughof the leaves and the beating of their own hearts. They came to risingground, and mounting it, found themselves upon a chinquepin ridge, andbefore them an abrupt descent of rain-washed, boulder-strewn earth. Itwas so nearly a precipice that Patricia shrunk back with an exclamationof dismay.
"I will go first," said Landless. "Give me your hands. So!"
Half way down, the earth began to slip. Patricia, looking up and overher shoulder, uttered a cry. A great boulder, imbedded in the earthdirectly above them, was dislodging itself, was falling! At her cryLandless raised his eyes, saw the threatening mass, caught her aroundthe waist, and with one supreme effort swung her out of the path of theavalanche which descended the next moment, bearing him with it to theground beneath.
He was recalled to consciousness by the dash of water against his face,and opened his eyes to behold Patricia bending over him, very white,with tragic eyes, and lips pressed closely together. She had run to theriver, flowing through the sunshine a hundred yards away, for water,which she had brought back in his cap, and she had taken the kerchieffrom her neck, wet it, and laid it upon his forehead. Her hands weretorn and bleeding. He saw them and uttered an exclamation. "It isnothing," she said; "I had to move the rock." Scarcely fully consciousas yet, his eyes glanced from her to the great rock which lay upon oneside, and upon which there were bloodstains. "I have had a bad fall," hesaid unsteadily, but with an attempt to speak lightly because of thetrouble in her eyes, "but it is over. Come! we must hurry on. We have notime to lose."
As he spoke he strove to rise, but with the effort came a pang ofanguish, and he sank back, faint and sick, upon the ground.
"Ah! you cannot!" cried Patricia with a great sob in her voice. "It isyour foot. The rock fell upon it."
After a moment of lying with closed eyes, he sat up and with his knifebegan to cut away the moccasin from the wounded limb. Presently helooked up. "Yes, it is badly crushed. There is no doing anything withit."
For many moments they gazed at each other in a despairing silence,broken by Patricia's low, "What are we to do now?"
"We must go on," answered Landless. "It is death to stay here."
Holding by the bank against which he had leaned, he dragged himself upand stood for an instant with eyes dark with pain; then, setting hislips, took a step forward. The bronze of his face paled, and beads ofanguish stood upon his brow, but he took another step. Patricia, thetears running down her cheeks, came to him and put his arm around hershoulder. "I will be your crutch," she said, striving to smile. "I willcarry the gun, too."
Before them was a steeply sloping, grass-grown ascent rising to a brokenline of cliffs, scarred and gray, crowned with cedars and hung here andthere with crimson creepers, and with a chance medley of huge grayboulders scattered about their base. Up this ascent they labored, soslowly that the crags seemed like the mountain in the Arabian tale, everreceding as they advanced. Twice Landless staggered and fell to hisknee, but when, after what seemed an eternity of pain and distress, theyreached the summit and Patricia would have had him rest, he shook hishead and motioned with his hand towards the narrow, boulder-strewnplateau at the foot of the crags.
With her accustomed unquestioning obedience she turned towards therocks, and after another interval of painful toil they found themselvesin a sort of rocky chamber, a natural blockhouse, of which the sheercliff formed one wall and boulders of varying height and shape theothers.
Above them gleamed the blue sky; through the gaps between the rocks theylooked down upon the shining river and the parti-colored woods, andbehind them towered the cliffs. A strong wind was blowing and it sentred leaves from the vines that draped the rock whirling down upon them.
"The tall gray crags," said Patricia in a strange voice, "and theMartinmas wind. The river flowing in the sunshine too."
Landless sank upon the rocky floor. "I can go no further," he said. "Godhelp me!"
"I do not think another man could have come so far," she answered. "Whatare we to do now?"
"You must go on without me."
She cried out angrily, "What do you mean? I don't understand you."
"Listen," he said earnestly, dragging himself closer to her. "We can bebut a very few leagues from the falls, still fewer from the Indianvillages above them. Reach one of those villages and you are safe fromthese devils at least. We have kept the start of them. They may notreach this spot for several hours, and when they come, I will keep themhere, God helping me, for more hours than one. This place is a naturalfortress, and they have no guns. They will not take me until myammunition is exhausted, and you know there is store of bullets andpowder. They will think that you are with me, hidden behind the rocks--"
"And I shall be with you!" she cried vehemently.
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sp; "No, no. You must go through this pass in the cliff to the right of us,and thence down the river with all your speed. Please God, to-morrowwill find you in safety. It is the only way. To stay here is to fallinto their hands. And you must not delay. You must go at once."
"And you--" she said in a whisper.
"What does it matter if I lose my life to-day instead of a few weekshence? I grieve for this," with a glance at his foot, "because it keepsme from being with you, from guarding you into perfect safety. Otherwiseit does not matter. You lose time, madam."
She stood with heaving bosom and foot tapping the ground, an expressionthat he could not read in her wonderful eyes. "I am not going," she saidat last.
Prisoners of Hope: A Tale of Colonial Virginia Page 34
